


As We Are So Wonderfully Done With Each Other

by sweetestdrain



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Genderswap, Incest, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-22
Updated: 2009-11-22
Packaged: 2017-10-03 14:33:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 18,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19170
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sweetestdrain/pseuds/sweetestdrain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam is changed.  And then everything else changes, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Just a note -- this fic was written five years ago (as of 2014) and is very much a product of the Supernatural fanfic culture of the time (as well as the author's relative youth and knowledge). It was written primarily as a reaction to the glut of "genderswap" fic being posted in 2009, and as a result, this fic borrows heavily from older fandom tropes and plays fast and loose with issues of sex and gender identity. It's pretty fantastical and a bit melodramatic, and is not at ALL meant to reflect real lived experiences of trans and/or genderqueer people. In the interest of internet archival, I'm leaving the fic online in its original form, but I wanted to take a moment to provide context and acknowledge (and give you a heads up) that the fic definitely has its problems. If you choose to read on, I hope you enjoy -- otherwise, thanks for stopping in, and I hope another fic (or vid) of mine will interest you instead.

They're in Georgia when it happens. Figures. Dean has always hated Georgia. He hates the roads, how the dirt churned up beside the lanes is an eerie blood-red, he hates how poison-green kudzu is choking out all the trees. The sun shines too brightly and the air is too thick.

So really, it figures it'd be something in Georgia to totally screw them over.

They're cleaning out an undead coven on the outskirts of Savannah - and really, talk about making a pact with the Devil, they'd had contracts drawn up and everything - when Sam suddenly falters in the middle of slicing some zombie witch's head off.

It takes Dean a second to notice, because some other zombie witch is coming at him with a pencil - a pencil? A freaking _sharp_ pencil - and Sam is covering him. It's only when another witch almost gets in a shot at Dean's shoulder that he realizes that Sam is no longer covering him; that Sam is on the floor, unconscious, maybe worse.

The rest of the coven doesn't last long. Not after Dean sees Sam on the floor.

So it's only minutes before Dean makes it to Sam's side, holding his breath, hoping that it was just a freaky vision or maybe Sam got brained by a lamp, anything, brain injuries aren't as bad as all that, just let Sam be okay.

He flips Sam over, checking his pulse. And Sam's okay.

That's the first thing Dean notices, checking the steady rise and fall of Sam's breath just to make sure, then he notices the rest. For one thing, Sam seems shorter. And Sam's clothes don't quite fit anymore; his T-shirt is hanging loose at the shoulders and stretches oddly across his chest.

It takes Dean a moment of staring to get it.

Sam has _boobs_.

In fact, Sam's boobs aren't the only thing about him that's girlish. Dean can see the little things, now. Changes in muscle structure, in girth; the way Sam's features have lightened, almost opened out on themselves, causing him to look distinctly more feminine.

"Shit," Dean swears, and he looks around, stupidly, for anything that might have done this. All the witches are dead. He doesn't know what else to do.

Sam is starting to stir, and Dean doesn't know what to tell him when he wakes up. _Um, dude, you're a chick,_ doesn't quite seem to cover the enormity of the situation.

Sam moans. "Ow. Shit."

"Um," says Dean.

Sam's eyes flutter open. "Dean?" And hell, even Sam's voice is different. That's just not right.

"Dude," says Dean. "You're a chick."

Sam just looks at Dean confusedly for a moment, then looks down.

"Oh," says Sam.

"I'm calling Bobby," says Dean.

 

*

 

Bobby promises to call them back as soon as he knows anything. Dean and Sam gather up some of the spell books that the witches were using and take them back to their motel room to look over. Sam keeps wincing and has a tendency to overbalance, cursing under his breath when he thinks Dean won't notice.

"Sam, just sit the hell down," Dean snaps finally.

Sam grumbles, but sits. If Dean hadn't been looking for the wince, he probably wouldn't have noticed it.

"What is it," Dean says. "Are you hurt?"

Sam looks at him like he's an idiot. "Uh, Dean? All of my bones have shrunk, my chromosomes have been completely rearranged, my hormones are probably out of whack, and, oh yes, somebody gave me a freaking _vagina._ So I'm a little bit sore, yeah."

"Right," says Dean. "I knew that." He ignores Sam's eyeroll, and goes to get some Ibuprofen from their supplies. Sam takes them with a groan of appreciation, then flops back on the bed, sighing.

"You need anything else?" Dean, after a moment's hesitation, grabs hold of one of Sam's legs and starts to massage his calf, like he would if Sam got a charley horse. It's strange, for a moment; Sam's leg feels different than it usually does, smaller maybe, or more compact. Sam's jeans are loose and bunch up around Dean's hands.

Sam's grunt of approval is sign enough to Dean that it's helping, though, so he works at the calf until Sam nods jerkily, then he switches to the other leg.

"God, Dean," Sam murmurs. "That's really helping. Thanks."

"No prob, bro," Dean grins, then he moves up past the knee, starting to knead at Sam's thigh. Sam jerks under his touch. "Whoops, sorry."

"No," says Sam. "No, it didn't hurt. Keep going."

Dean casts a glance at Sam's face, but Sam is just staring at the ceiling. Shrugging, Dean goes back to his work, digging his fingers into the muscles of Sam's leg.

Sam makes a soft noise, and Dean suddenly realizes that his hands have made their way to the base of Sam's thigh. Sam has let his leg fall open a few inches, sprawling loosely and making it easier for Dean to access - well, - everything.

Dean suddenly flashes on what Sam had just said: _a freaking _vagina - and he gives Sam a brief, manly pat on the thigh before drawing away. "There you go," Dean says, trying to ignore the fact that Sam, as a girl, smells really fucking good up close.

"Thanks. Can you hand me -- I should look at some of those books, figure out what did this," says Sam, but his voice sounds tired and faraway.

"Nah, man, don't worry about it," Dean says. "I'll start going through them while you grab some shut-eye, okay?"

"Okay," says Sam, and between one second and the next, Sam falls asleep like that, his - her? - legs askew, face smashed into the edge of a pillow. Dean just stares at Sam for a minute, in this new (and hopefully temporary) body, and he wonders.

Then Dean draws the covers up over Sam and gently nudges Sam's head onto the pillow. Sam makes a noise and curls toward Dean's hands, tugging the blankets closer in sleep. Dean hasn't seen Sam sleep curled up like that since he was fourteen.

Dean just looks, and looks, and then he turns away and goes to brush his teeth.

 

*

 

Dean doesn't have any luck with the books, but there's a ton of them, and he's at least managed to narrow down the pile of possibles. He calls it quits for the night around 3am, sprawling face-down on the bed and trying to ignore Sam's soft sleep-noises.

When Dean wakes up, Sam's already been awake for a while. Dean catches him coming out of the shower, desperately trying to keep the skimpy motel towel wrapped around his torso. Dean blinks down at Sam's long, girl-shaped legs, his eyes catching on the curve of Sam's calf and the pale, soft skin behind Sam's knee.

Sam's squawk of indignation snaps Dean out of it, and he gives Sam a shrug. "Hey, man, just admiring your new goods."

"You're so gross," Sam mutters. Sam is blushing bright red, and it takes Dean only a moment to realize that the flush on Sam's face was there even before his curse-given chick body got ogled by his older brother.

"Me?" Dean said, knowing _just_ what Sam was up to in the shower only minutes before. "I'm just looking, dude, you're the one who's taking it for a test drive!"

"Oh my God, shut _up_," Sam moans, and he stomps past Dean and pulls some clothes out of his duffel. While Dean is still watching, Sam gives a grunt of frustration and lets his towel fall to the floor, giving Dean a flash of familiar tanned skin and unfamiliar curves before it's at least partially concealed by a white T-shirt. The shirt hangs awkwardly and loose on Sam's shoulders, and the worn fabric does nothing to conceal the shape of his high, firm breasts.

Dean swallows hard and tries not to think about what Sam must have been doing in the shower, tries not to think about Sam's long, strong fingers and brand new girl parts and the way the two things would fit together.

He's used to watching Sam, he's been doing it all his life for one reason or another. At first it was _take care of your brother_ and then _make sure he stays safe, protect him at all costs, Dean,_ and then, almost unwillingly, it turned into Dean's gaze on the twist of Sam's forearms at sixteen, Sam's broad shoulders at eighteen. Dean had grown accustomed to Sam's body and the ways in which it could capture his attention, the ways that Sam could stick Dean's heart somewhere in his esophagus with a single word. Part of that was _brothers_, sure, but there was something else there, too.

But Dean was not prepared for this: his brother's form twisted into a woman with smooth skin, a killer ass, and brown hair that fell sharply over intelligent eyes. Dean would find that body mesmerizing enough _without_ Sam inside it; the combination of the two trips him up, makes him keep staring past the time he should have looked away.

Dean gives a silent sigh and, with the strength of much better men, he makes an effort to stop drooling over Sam's predicament. Really, couldn't the witches have made his brother an _ugly_ chick?

Sam pulls on a pair of boxers and pushes his hair out of his face, then picks up one of the coven's books, already slipping into deep-research-mode. Dean sighs and goes to get some breakfast for carryout. This may take a while.

 

*

 

"So, I was thinking," says Sam, "We should probably wait around town until we hear back from Bobby. If we need to get anything from the coven, anything we may have overlooked earlier."

"Yeah," says Dean, and they stick around. Sam is wearing his old clothes, now baggy, with his jeans cinched up tight on the first belt notch. If Sam had shrunk in height any more it would have been impossible, but the arrangement will work until Sam's back to normal again.

On the fourth day of Sam being a girl, they've both grown tired of tiptoeing around each other and being cooped up in their tiny motel room. Neither of them have had any luck finding out what spell did this, and while Dean's feeling rather pissed about the whole situation himself, Sam's oozing frustration from every pore. Dean had to stop him from throwing one of the books against the wall earlier, and when Sam's in a book-harming mood? You _know_ things are bad.

Dean can tell Sam's about to start practicing biblio-mutilation again, which Dean really doesn't want to be near - those paper cuts are nasty fuckers - so he stands up and announces, "I'm going out."

"Thank God," says Sam, and stands, unconsciously crossing his arms in front of his breasts. "Me too."

Dean blinks, but goes with it. "Okay," he says. "Let's go, then. There's a bar just up the road --"

Sam shakes his head. "Uh. No, I'm gonna - go somewhere else. Have fun, though."

"Oh." Dean nods, not really getting it. Maybe Sam wanted to go to a 24-hour library or a laundromat or something. "Okay."

When Dean gets back, slightly drunk but mostly just exhausted - who knew that sitting around for days could be so tiring? - Sam isn't back yet. Dean slumps on the bed, turns on the TV to watch some infomercials. It's another forty minutes before a taxi pulls up outside and Sam gets out.

When Sam comes into the room, Dean is a little too distracted by his brother's disheveled appearance to make any comments about the lateness of the hour, or even joke about his brother getting some - because _damn_ if his brother didn't get some. Dean stares.

Sam says "Uh," and scratches his neck self-consciously. His lips are red and bitten, his hair is even worse than usual, and there's lipstick smeared across his collar, how cliché -

Dean yelps.

"You got some _hot lesbian action_ and you didn't _invite_ me, Sammy?"

"Oh my God, I _hate you_," Sam says, flushing bright red, and then he shuts himself in the bathroom.

Dean pounds on the door. "Come on, you can tell your big bro. Was she hot? Dude! I can't believe you just went girl-on-girl on me, man. Way to go!"

"Shut up, Dean!" Sam shouts through the door. "You're such a perv."

Dean just laughs. Way to _go,_ Sammy.

 

*

 

A week after Sam turns into a girl, Dean calls Bobby. Before Dean can even ask, Bobby says, "I'm working on it."

"But have you found anything?" says Dean.

Sam's starting to get edgy and frustrated with his new body. He keeps bumping into things and misbalancing, impatient with the unfamiliarity of his shape and body weight. He and Dean can't even go hunting to blow off steam, because Sam would have to train and get used to his girl body before having a hope of holding his own against any nasty critters. Dean had suggested that they could go through some exercises, but Sam just shook his head, said he wouldn't be in the body long enough to worry about it. Then he went back to research, despite the fact that neither he nor Dean had any idea what spell they were looking for.

That had been two days ago.

And even worse, Sam has given up on the modesty of the first few days and is starting to just drop his towel and walk around naked everywhere. Dean's starting to get a complex. It was bad enough when Sam looked like his really hot kid brother; Sam looking like a really hot - and naked - chick instead is just messing Dean up. Nobody wants to pop a boner over their brother-turned-sister all the time, especially not when said sibling is liable to punch said Nobody in the face if he catches said Nobody staring at his ass again.

Dean drags his mind away from the thought of Sam's ass in time to hear Bobby say, "I'm still going over some different possibilities." He sounds stressed, and Dean gets a weird feeling.

"But there's a way, right?" says Dean. Bobby doesn't respond. "I mean, we can turn him back, right?"

"You said the coven had some books?" Bobby asks. "If I could take a look at them, that could maybe help."

Dean looks over at Sam, his nose still buried deep in the books in question. "I'll ask Sam," Dean says. "Anything else?"

"The longer I spend on the phone with you, the longer it takes for me to find out what did this. I'll call when I know something."

"But - okay, thanks, Bobby," says Dean. Bobby just grunts acknowledgement and hangs up on him.

Dean asks Sam if they can send the books to Bobby. He expects a protest - these books are the only hope for figuring this out themselves , after all - but all he gets from Sam is a tired look and a nod.

They pack up the books and FedEx them to Bobby. Sam goes out again that night, but Dean doesn't ask where.

 

*

 

Finally, two weeks after Sam turns into a girl, Bobby calls.

"First, you've gotta understand," Bobby tells Dean, "I looked through all of those spell books you sent and then some. I've been looking for weeks."

"I know, Bobby," says Dean. That's why Bobby's always been their best hope for this; he knows his shit.

"And I don't blame you boys for not being able to find it," Bobby adds. "Hell, I nearly didn't. But I did, and I checked out everything else on this spell that I could find. So when I say what I'm about to say, I'm not saying it lightly."

Dean pauses, says, "Right. I know."

"There's no way," says Bobby.

Dean breathes. Sam, who is watching Dean's face intently, raises his eyebrows in concern for whatever expression Dean is making.

"The spell the witches used was set as a trap," Bobby says in his gruff, kind voice. "They set things up with a sort of, uh, psychic tripwire, so anyone who messed with their coven would get struck down by a curse. What curse it ended up being depended on a random set of factors, like distance from their altar and any other object they set up as an anchor. It also could have been tied to some of the witches themselves, it's kind of hard to tell. But my point is, there were about twenty different curses that Sam could have had instead of this, and there weren't none of them pretty. Do you understand me, Dean?"

"Yeah," Dean's almost laughing, because there's no way he's hearing what he thinks he's hearing. "Uh, when you say there's _no way,_ do you mean -"

"I mean that there's no way to undo it. They kept good notes, so I know exactly how many safeguards are built into that thing that hit Sam. The witches didn't intend anyone to survive the initial curse, and frankly, I'm surprised Sam's body held up to the change. If he'd been a smaller man, he might not have survived it."

"But there's gotta be _some_ way. Somewhere you haven't looked yet."

"Dean," says Bobby. "If I tried to break those safeguards, I'd probably end up turning Sam into a puddle of melted bone and tissue before I got anywhere close to the original spell. I got nothing. I only got this: you and your brother are both alive, and damn lucky. You should value that and let the rest go."

Let the rest go. His brother was now his sister, _permanently_, and Dean was supposed to just let that go?

"Let me talk to Sam," says Bobby.

Dean doesn't even realize he's clutching the phone, staring at nothing, until Sam snags the phone from his hand.

"Hey, Bobby," Sam says into the receiver. "Thanks for checking into things for us." He pauses, gives Dean an unreadable look. "Yeah, I think I've got a pretty good idea what you found."

Dean thinks he might throw up.

"No, it's going okay," says Sam. "Thanks for asking. Yeah, I know, Bobby. We know."

Another pause.

"Thanks again, Bobby. Have a good one."

Sam drops the phone back on the cradle with a clatter.

"Sam," says Dean, but Sam turns and marches into the bathroom. When Dean follows, Sam meets his eyes in the mirror.

"Well," says Sam, "I guess this is the new me, huh?"

"Prettier than the last version," Dean says, but the joke falls flat, dead flat, and Dean can't take it. "Hey, uh. You want to go check out that bar up the road? Or, uh, that place you went to the other night?" Dean feels like getting really, really drunk.

"Nah," says Sam. "You go."

"Hey, come on. It'll be fun."

"Dean," says Sam. He's -- she's just staring straight ahead, staring at her face in the mirror. "I really need you to leave me alone right now, okay?"

"Okay," says Dean. "Okay."

He backs out of the bathroom, and can only watch as Sam closes the door, closes him out.

 

*

 

Sam goes out and buys girl clothes the next day. She comes back laden with shopping bags and an odd look on her face.

"Do you have any idea how hard it is to find a bra that _fits_?" she says, and gives a little shift, like maybe she's wearing one now and finds it uncomfortable. Dean can't help it, he looks, and yeah, Sam's wearing a bra. She's also wearing a plain scoop-neck tee, baggy jeans, and her hair is brushed back. She looks like a stranger, and at the same time, she looks exactly like Sam.

"You know," says Sam, and Dean realizes, too late, that he's been staring at her chest. "It's okay."

"Huh?" Dean squints at her, and has the feeling he's just missed something.

Sam sends him a stiff smile. "It's okay if you think I'm, uh, hot or something."

Dean almost chokes. "Jesus, no. Sam, you're my -"

He really doesn't even know how to finish that sentence, because Sam's not his brother anymore, is she?

"I'm just saying it's okay." Sam shrugs, sits on the floor, and starts to unpack her shopping bags, working on switching out the clothing in her duffel with things that'll actually fit. Dean watches her agonize for a moment over an old shirt that he knows is one of Sam's favorites; with a sigh, Sam tosses it to the side.

"Hey, don't get rid of that," Dean says. "You might have gone down about fifty dress sizes or whatever, but your shit'll still fit me."

"Yeah, okay." She tosses some clothes over in his direction: two flannel shirts, a few faded tees. A hooded sweatshirt, slightly ripped from the hunt before last.

Dean catches the sweatshirt, folds it absently. He used to pack Sam's clothes for him when he was a little kid and Sam couldn't figure out how to get things folded down into his bag. Sam would try, but eventually Dean would have to go over everything, folding it carefully so that everything would fit just so instead of spilling out over the zipper.

"Why would it be okay, Sam?" Dean looks at the folded sweatshirt for a moment, then shakes it out and tosses it over at his own duffel. "What the hell even makes you say that?"

Sam is silent for a moment, focused on pulling the tags off a plain white bra.

"I see you watching," she says finally. "And I know some of it's the whole, you know, how weird this is... but it seems like there's something else there, too. Maybe I'm wrong. I just, I want you to know that it's okay."

Dean stares at his hands. "Don't ever think that it's okay, Sammy. If I ever, uh, make you uncomfortable. Just tell me. I just don't know how to..."

Sam laughs. "You think I do?" She tosses the empty bags to the side and leans against the edge of the bed. "So, you have been watching."

"Yeah." Dean shifts, thinks, screw it, Sam already knows Dean's a horndog. As long as that's all Sam knows. "Yeah, I. I have. I mean, you do make a hot girl, Sammy."

Sam tilts her head back to stare at the ceiling. The slope of her neck is new and surprising. Dean looks away.

"Jeez, sorry," says Dean, defensive even though Sam hasn't said anything. "It's true. You expect a guy not to look?" Dean doesn't know how his voice can remain so casual; this whole conversation is burning in his gut, a slow ember of dread.

Sam says nothing for a long minute. Finally, she pulls her knees up to her chest and hooks her arms around them, resting her chin on her hands. "Can I ask you a question?"

Dean thinks _No. Please, no._ He says, "Yeah, sure. Whatever."

"Um." Sam closes her eyes. "Maybe, okay, this is weird. But did you watch me... before?"

Dean gives a sudden, disbelieving chuckle. "Um, what?"

"Before," Sam says, her face slowly turning red. "Or is it just, uh, because you're living with a woman now and sometimes you see her naked and it's kind of cool."

"You're not a woman, you're my kid brother."

"Don't you get it?" Sam shakes her head. "I'm _both._ I just want to know which --" she cuts herself off, and Dean has no idea where she was trying to go with that thought, and he doesn't want to know.

"Nah, Sammy," Dean lies through his teeth. "I know I might've always _said_ you were a chick, but uh, back then you weren't really my type, you know what I mean. Plus, dude, the whole thing where we're related."

Sam's face closes up like one of those little origami puzzles, pinched up tight. "Right," she nods. "Well, whatever, I get it. Just, for God's sake stop staring at my ass."

She gets up then, probably to throw away the shopping bags, and Dean makes a show of checking Sam out, just to piss her off. Sam gives him the finger and a muttered "_Christ_, Dean," but she's smiling under that scowl, so Dean counts a win.

He waits till Sam's fiddling with something in the bathroom to bury his face in his hands, breathe out shakily. He knows the terror must be coming off him in waves; he's amazed Sam didn't notice.

By the time Sam comes back out, Dean's her big brother again, a little bit obnoxious and a lot horny but _normal_, with all those other thoughts folded away back to where they won't give anybody any shit.

 

*

 

Sam still goes out sometimes, comes back all mussed and smelling like sweat and cigarette smoke. She doesn't tell Dean where she goes, but Dean called her on her cell phone once and Sam answered right away, like she _knew_ Dean might get all paranoid and try to check up on her nocturnal activities.

The one time Dean called, he could hear the sound of a bar in the background, people talking, some girl giggling near Sam. Dean had made up some sorry-ass reason for calling, something about not knowing where some of their notes were, and Sam had answered patiently, with that tone in her voice that said _I know exactly what you're doing, you freak, so just hang up the phone and leave me to my hot lesbian encounters._

"Thanks, Sammy," Dean told her, and got off the phone right quick.

Dean supposes Sam's sex life makes sense, in a way. Sam is no longer a guy, which provides hours and hours of entertainment, Dean's sure - plus, no one can be that celibate for that long without building up lots of horny frustration. Dean can't begrudge Sam a bit of drunken shenanigans and a few one night stands, God knows Dean's partaken in enough of those himself.

And even the lesbian thing makes sense. Sam's still a guy on the inside, after all, and the packaging apparently doesn't change who you're attracted to. Sam even looks the part of the big, butch dyke, with her no-nonsense clothes and lack of make-up. Sam doesn't shave her legs and armpits, either, and Dean supposes most lesbians get off on that. He wouldn't know, not being a lesbian and all, but he's been known to maybe get off on that too. Not all the time, of course, but sometimes. If he's with the right chick, one that makes that coarse hair look like it belongs there, like it's so natural she couldn't be without it. Dean could dig that.

By the time Dean realizes that he's been thinking about Sam's pubes for the past ten minutes - dark, wiry curls that he glimpses as Sam leaves the shower or drops her towel, those curls hiding that dark space between Sam's legs, those soft pink glistening layers that Dean could just -

Anyway, by the time Dean realizes that he's been sitting there like an idiot with a giant hard-on for his brother/sister for the past ten, fifteen minutes, or, okay, maybe closer to half an hour - Sam comes stumbling back into the room, drunk and giddy off her ass. She smells like bar again, stinks of alcohol.

She flops onto the bed, legs askew, and blinks slowly at Dean. "You're up."

"Yeah." Dean thinks maybe he should make an attempt to hide his monster erection, but he doubts that Sam's in any state to notice his condition. He shifts and crosses his legs anyway, wincing at the chafe of his jeans. "Uh. You're back."

"Yup." Sam flops backwards, throwing her arms up over her head. "Dean. You'll never _guess_."

Dean smirks, ignoring the flare of jealousy. "Really? What was her name?"

Sam laughs drunkenly, raises a lazy hand and points at him. "No, really, you'll never guess," she says. "It was a _guy._"

Dean is already up and across the room, standing over Sam, before he realizes what he's doing. He wants to ask what this guy's name is, has vague thoughts of hunting the dude down and punching his face in, but Dean's voice has left him. Sam stares up at him, her eyes looking way too clear for the amount of wasted she is.

"What is it, Dean?" she murmurs. "Jealous?"

Dean takes in a harsh breath, leans down and plants his hands on either side of Sam's head. "What'd he do to you?" Dean asks. "Did you let him fuck you?"

Sam just gazes at Dean's face for a minute, then shakes her head no. "He bought me a drink," she says. "Kinky fucker. Wanted me to eat out his girlfriend while he watched."

Dean's arms tremble. "And?"

"I let him put his hand down my pants," says Sam. "Kissed his girlfriend." She scissors her legs suddenly, catching Dean in the knee and knocking him onto the bed, half on top of her. "Then I blew him off. He was an asshole." Blowing hot breath right in Dean's ear: "Reminded me of you."

Dean raises up on his knees, presses a hand to the seat of Sam's jeans. The denim is hot against his fingers, and she leans against the touch, catches Dean's fingers between her own and puts them at the waist of her jeans. Dean undoes that one metal button and pulls the zipper down, sees a flash of panties -- _panties_, for God's sake.

Dean shoves Sam's hands away and pushes himself up, goes into the bathroom and locks the door. He's still hard. Sam is saying something outside the door, something loud and brash and slurred, some drunken ramble about Dean's questionable parentage. Dean ignores her.

He doesn't come back out until Sam's long asleep, and then he just stands there and watches, like the crazy incestuous pervert he obviously is. Dean should have known something was up when Sam first started going out all the time. That's not Sam's territory at all, all that pointless fucking, that's Dean's job. Sam's just, messed up or something. Overcompensating now that she doesn't have a dick anymore.

Dean thinks about how Sam has changed, but this time he focuses on things other than the obvious. Now that he looks back on it, it's not just Sam's new tendency to pick up girls that's different - Sam's louder now, too. She carries herself a little tougher, a little brasher. When she and Dean go out together, she'll get up in people's faces, hustle pool. She drinks more. She, fuck, she drinks a _lot_.

Sam mumbles in her sleep, turns over. Dean wonders how tough it must be to try to learn a whole new place in the world, one where people not only look at you differently but treat you differently, too. People like your own brother, who you should have been able to count on, who should always take care of you, no matter what.

There's a sick feeling in his gut. Dean sits down on his bed and starts to rub his hand over his eyes. He stops when he realizes his fingers still smell like her.

 

*

 

They don't stop driving again for another three states. Their motel room is decorated all in varying shades of burgundy, like somebody killed a goat in the room, threw all the blood around, then just left it to dry. Lovely.

Sam's got her hand on the doorknob when Dean stops her.

"Sam," he says. "That's not you."

She turns around, gives him this incredulous look, like she doesn't even know what he's talking about. Dean doesn't buy it. Sammy's never been dumb.

"Just don't," Dean says.

Sam shakes her head. "It's not that easy."

She doesn't come back until four in the morning, staggering and swearing at the furniture. Dean jolts awake, hadn't really been all the way asleep anyway. He'd been waiting.

"Hey, that chair hasn't done anything to you," he tells Sam, but Sam's just gone, on her knees, retching helplessly. "Christ," Dean swears, and he gets up to help her.

"I can't, I can't," Sam keeps saying, and Dean has to practically carry her to the bathroom. When they get there, she pukes again, her thin shoulders straining against the toilet bowl. Dean rubs her back, wonders just how much she's had to drink and if he should start to worry about alcohol poisoning.

Sam finally stops gagging and looks at Dean blearily. She's pale and sweaty, and Dean hands her a wet towel to wipe her mouth with. She does so, then spits disgustedly into the toilet and slumps against the side of the tub.

"You okay?"

Sam doesn't respond at first, and then slowly shakes her head.

"You need to drink some water," Dean says. He almost reaches out, wants to touch her, hold her, but then he thinks of how he would have treated the old Sam and keeps his hands off. "Sam, how much did you drink? Do you remember?"

Sam shakes her head again. "It's kind of ironic," she says creakily, "That it takes me being _this_," and she makes a swooping motion that Dean supposes to mean the whole being a girl thing, "to turn me into _Dad._"

Dean grits his teeth. "Don't be a little bitch, Sammy."

She looks up at him, all red-rimmed bleary eyes. "Kinda late for that."

"Dad was never like this," says Dean, and knows it's the wrong thing to say even as it comes out of his mouth. "He was never such a fucking mess."

"You didn't even _see_, Dean!" Sam yells. Her breath is rank and her face is too pale, and Dean flinches. "You didn't even _know_, not with either of us. Dad would get stinking drunk and you would just look the other way. I've, I've been doing this for weeks, and _tonight_ you say stop?"

"So, what, you're just trying to get my attention? Thought you'd fuck a lot of girls and then puke all over me, see if I noticed you were having a tough time?" Dean's heart feels like it's being squeezed apart, hammering hard and frantic in his chest. "And don't you fucking talk about Dad. He wasn't a fucking drunk."

There had been a bad summer. One bad summer. It had been ten years since Mom died and Dad wasn't any closer to finding out who or what did it, and there'd been a bad summer. That was all, and it had never happened again. Dean's father was not a drunk, no matter what Sam thought, no matter what Sam had told all his shiny new Stanford friends.

"Even after he got himself killed, you _still_ stick up for him," Sam says, and her voice is lethal, her voice is poison, and how could Dean have forgotten this, the last few months before Sam left for school and all the fucking silences and all the fucking arguments and no one ever looking at Dean, no one ever giving him a chance to make things better.

"Shut up," says Dean. "Shut up. You stupid fucking cunt," and he stands up, trembling, and leaves Sam on the bathroom floor.

 

*

 

In the morning, Dean wakes up to the smell of coffee. He inhales deeply and twists, trying to scent it out. For Winchesters, coffee means _I'm sorry_ and _forgive me?_, and Dean is tired and doesn't want to fight, so he snags the cup sitting on the bedside table and does both.

"There's a haunting in Ohio," says Sam. She looks like shit and her hair is greasy, but she didn't die of alcohol poisoning after all, so that's something. "I thought maybe we could check it out."

Dean blows on the coffee to cool it. "You sure?"

"Yeah." Sam shrugs. "I mean, sure, new body, but. I need to figure out how to use this thing sometime, right?"

They start with some sparring drills, and Sam keeps turning green at every sudden motion, but she does okay even with the hangover. She's not ever going to be as good as she was - there's no way her new body weight can support the amount of muscle she had as a guy, for one thing - but she'll still be able to hold her own once she gets back in shape. At least the past few weeks have helped Sam grow accustomed to her new center of gravity.

After that, they hike out into the woods and do some target practice. Sam gets the hang of it quickly, and Dean wondered why they were so nervous about this, thinking that Sam could never be the same again. He's starting to get used to Sam's new shape, her new face and new everything. Sometimes Dean even forgets entirely, because out of the corner of his eye, Sam doesn't look _that_ different... but then the angle will shift or a shadow will move across Sam's face and Dean remembers.

Dean dreams of Sam sometimes, the old, male version of Sam. He knows that logically, Sam is the same as he ever was, despite the various physical changes, but on those nights Dean still wakes up missing Sam so hard he can't breathe. He'll look at Sam in the next bed but it never helps, and Dean has to close his eyes and think of the Sam that was taller than him, the Sam that had a gentle smile and a wicked laugh, with wide, broad hands and a streak of morality a mile wide. He doesn't know if he's ever going to find that Sam again.

By the next night, they're in Illinois. Dean has no idea where Sam's going tonight, and he doesn't care. He just says, "I'm serious."

Sam pauses, halfway to the door, and waits.

Dean starts to get up, then sits back down, not sure if he should approach her. He just knows that he wants this to stop. "And I know I haven't been any help, and there's all this weird shit going on, but I'm still your brother, okay?"

Sam grimaces at that, but Dean goes on.

"And I just, you know. I'm here. I've known you all your life, since you were a shitty little baby in diapers. And I'm telling you, you might be a chick now, but you're not the kind of chick that would steal someone's girlfriend or let a guy stick a hand down her pants. Or get drunk just to not, not, whatever. You're not like that."

"That's real poetic, Dean." Sam sighs and turns to face Dean, thumbs stuck in her belt loops.

"Whatever," says Dean. "I mean it."

"What kind of 'chick' am I, then? How would you even know?"

"Because. You're _Sam_," says Dean.

Sam's face softens at that, but she's still just standing there in the middle of the room, not leaving but not really _staying_ either. Dean turns on the TV.

"C'mon, man," says Dean. "Let's order pizza and watch some mindless TV tonight. I'm sure there's some kind of Star Trek marathon or something that'd appeal to a big geek like you."

He pauses, adds, "Please." Not even really sure if it'll work, cause "please" has never stopped Sam before.

Sam's expression doesn't really change, but the corner of Sam's mouth smiles, just for a second, and Sam plops down on the bed next to Dean. "Geek?" she says. "_I'm_ the geek, Mr. Obscure B-Movie Factoid Man?"

"What? No. Those are _different_," Dean insists, but he doesn't care that Sam's laughing at him, because she's here, and she's not going to go fuck some random girl (or guy) in a bar somewhere. She's staying here with Dean.

And it doesn't matter just why that's so important to Dean, because the only thing that matters is that when Sam laughs, she sounds like Sam again, and any time she spends with Dean is time that she's not out getting herself fucked up.

Sam settles in, punching her pillow into shape, and Dean flips channels until he finds an old rerun of Law and Order.

Sam's presence beside him is disconcerting at first, and Dean tries to remember the last time they've been in close physical proximity just as _them,_ without anything hinky and weird going on, like Sam puking up her guts or like Dean's hand down Sam's jeans.

Dean thinks it might have been a long time, since before Sam turned into a girl, and he feels a little nauseous at the thought. Dean's been an asshole of a big brother, it's true, and he's not sure if Sam can forgive him for it. Or if she even should.

She thumps Dean hard in the shoulder.

"Ow!"

"If I don't get to go out and get laid, then you don't get to brood," Sam says. "Got it?"

Dean smiles, despite himself. He can't fool himself that any of this will work out, knows that it could crash and burn any second, but at least that's a familiar feeling. "Yeah, got it."

They both know how the episode of Law and Order ends, but they keep watching anyway. As the next episode starts up, Dean feels Sam's gaze on him.

"What?"

"Sorry," says Sam. Her voice is quiet. "I'm sorry."

Dean's vision blurs, just for a second, and he swallows. "Nothing to be sorry for," he says, and Sam just shakes her head and turns back to the screen. Two joggers find a body in a park, Jerry Orbach shows up and squints at the murder scene, and Sam falls asleep against Dean's shoulder.

 

*

 

They handle the haunting in Ohio, then the haunting in Maine, then they tackle an infestation of water monkeys near the Canadian border. Easy hunts at first, just so they can get their bearings again. Sam practices with Dean every day and it's like they're fifteen and nineteen again, working so hard to be good for Dad, to make him proud.

The parts where Sam ends up pinned under Dean, her breasts heaving against his chest, eyes full of angry sparks and something else that makes Dean's breath leave him, makes him hold her down a little more - well, that never happened when they were kids, but Dean has to admit he thought about it. Nothing happens; Dean makes his point, then he gets up and they try the move again. They do it until Dean's the one on his back, and then they do it a few more times for good measure.

Sam has to know this, and Dean has to know _her_ \-- get to know every part of her, relearn every piece. Then he'll be done, and he'll go no further.

Dean swears, no further.

 

*

 

Somewhere along the line, Sam gets her first period. Dean tells her he doesn't want to know anything about it, so for Christ's sake don't share the details, and Sam snorts and saves up the details until the next time Dean's trying to eat. Then it turns into Tampax 101 while Dean stares morosely at his fries.

"I have absolutely no sympathy," Sam tells him. "You're not the one bleeding from the uterus."

"_Sam,_" Dean hisses, and Sam grins and steals Dean's fries.

A few minutes later, she says, "Hey."

And Dean would ordinarily have ignored Sam, but there's an odd tone in her voice, so he looks up.

"How long has it been since I've had a vision?" Sam asks.

Dean has to think about it for a minute. The visions used to come pretty sporadically, but over the past few months they'd settled into a routine. Sam usually got about one or two a month, not counting nightmares.

But recently... Dean stops. How long had it even been since Sam had a nightmare?

He meets Sam's eyes, which look about as hollowed-out and shocked as Dean feels. "Shit," says Dean.

Sam nods, wordless.

"You think...?"

Sam shrugs. "Well," she says. "I _am_ kind of a different person now. Maybe he can't see me."

It can't be that easy.

Dean calls Bobby, but Bobby doesn't know either, says "maybe" and then something about mystical signatures that Dean doesn't really follow, but takes to mean that Bobby really just doesn't know.

He asks how Dean and Sam are doing, and Dean tells him they're doing okay. It's not even a lie.

 

*

 

Sam shaves her legs, cursing and swearing under her breath the whole time. Dean can hear her through the bathroom door, and when she finally comes limping out, there are bits of bloodied toilet paper stuck all over her knees and ankles.

"I never knew it was that difficult," she says. "Chicks have it rough, Dean."

"Yeah. Whine, whine," says Dean.

They're investigating a nasty poltergeist in Texas, and Dean and Sam have to dress as IRS agents. Long story. But the short story is that they're in the midst of small town freaking _Conservativesville_, Texas, and Sam thought it might be a good idea for her to dress "business-casual" to fit in with all the Laura Bushes that work at the IRS. Dean had been ready to just dress Sam up in a suit and tie like they always had, but he's got to admit she had a point.

But that was before Dean knew what a hassle it would be to get Sam dressed as a woman for _real_. Apparently business-casual for women means a skirt, and Sam had spent hours at Wal-Mart trying on different sizes and lengths. She came back muttering about how clothing manufacturers assumed that all women were the size of teddy bears. Or maybe she'd wanted to buy a teddy set or something. Dean hadn't really been listening. But hey, Sam's legs were really freaking long, and the thought of the skirt just reminded Dean of that fact all over again.

"What'd you shave with, a cheese grater?" Dean asks, and Sam gives him a withering look. She drops her towel and shimmies into her skirt sans underwear, and Dean has to distract himself by reading the motel's list of cable channels.

When he turns around again, Sam has already made her way to the bathroom and is trying to put on make-up. She's cursing again, a steady stream of litanies against not just clothing manufacturers but cosmetics companies, disposable razors, and the patriarchal system that insists on women having to paint their faces and doll themselves up like Barbies in order to be taken seriously in today's society.

Dean's heard Sam go on that same rant before Sam actually _was_ a girl. Once, just as a test, Dean had tried Sam's rant out on some hot blonde number pretty much verbatim, and sure enough, Dean had the girl's number before he even finished saying _women are expected to shave their legs, all for the pleasure of men? What's with that?_ Later, he'd found that despite her breathy _yeah, I know, right?_, the blonde herself shaved _everywhere_. Ironic. Dean didn't even know if she was a real blonde or not.

Right now, though, Sam wasn't gonna do herself any favors bringing up the patriarchy. Dean steps in, grabs the tube of lipstick from Sam's hand, and turns her face up to the light.

"Jesus," says Dean. "I thought you were _afraid_ of clowns, not _jealous_ of them."

Sam lets out a long-suffering sigh and rolls her eyes. "Don't talk about clowns. Just, don't." She points an accusatory finger at the lipstick in Dean's hand. "I don't even know how you're supposed to put that stuff on, man."

"I can see that. You don't look more girly and business-casual, dude, you just look more like a guy. Like a guy who can't put on make-up." Dean tears some toilet paper off the roll and hands it to her. "Here, wipe that off and let me do it."

Sam raises an eyebrow, but wipes the crooked maroon from her lips without a word. When she finishes, she plants her feet and puckers her lips, like she expects Dean to put it on when she's got her face like that.

"Jeez, Sam, don't be a dick about it," Dean says. He rubs his thumb along her cheek until she lets her face relax. Her jaw drops a little, mouth falling open. Perfect. Dean braces his hand and drags the lipstick along Sam's bottom lip, ignores the considering gaze she's got trained on him.

It's a little harder to do the top lip, especially with Sam flinching and making faces at the greasy feel of the lipstick like she's five, but Dean gets it on eventually. It still doesn't look quite even, but it's a damn sight better than it was before. Dean triumphantly hands the tube back to Sam, turning her to face the mirror.

Sam stares at herself for a second, stretching her wide mouth this way and that. Then she smacks her lips and turns to Dean.

"Do I even want to know where you learned how to do that?" she asks, her eyes twinkling.

Dean snorts. "Probably not."

She peers at herself in the mirror again. "Hey, can you do my eyeliner, too?"

"Uh, let's see." Dean throws the eyeliner at the back of Sam's head. "No. Have fun and try not to poke yourself in the eyeball."

"If I blind myself, it's your fault!" Sam tosses over her shoulder, but she picks up the eyeliner and presses her nose up to the mirror, squinting. Dean chuckles and leaves the bathroom, wincing in sympathy when the cursing starts up again pretty much immediately, mixed in with the occasional "ow!"

They'd start with the neighbors, Dean thought. Flash their IRS badges and strike the fear of God - or the IRS - into them, get them talking. Sam would pull her old doe-eyed routine, only this time with the help of two X chromosomes. They'd get a bead on this poltergeist and make a plan, take the fucker out. Just like old times. Easy-peasy.

 

*

 

On second thought, Dean really hated Texas, too. Maybe even more than Georgia. It was hard to say through the crippling pain and the blood and the feeling of his guts pouring out through his hands.

"Shit, shit, shit," Sam is saying in his ear, "Dean? Just hold on, man, we're getting you some help, you're gonna be okay, shit, Dean?"

"Sam?" Dean tries to say. His mouth is full of blood, and he's pretty sure Sam is crying, but he can't tell in the darkness of the basement. She's peeling his hands away from his stomach, and Dean wants to tell her to stop, his guts are gonna come out, but she's insistent, and it's easier just to let go.

He almost misses the shuddery breath that Sam lets out, something like relief. "Okay. Okay. It's not that bad, Dean, I swear. It's not good either, but you're gonna be okay, you're gonna be just fine."

She rips off her T-shirt and presses it against Dean's belly, puts Dean's hands back over the wadded fabric to staunch the blood flow, and Dean tries. He blinks, things coming into a little more focus. Sam's topless now, in just her plain white bra that's now streaked with Dean's blood. Her hair is wild and in her face, and she's looking at Dean like he's everything.

She's _beautiful_.

Dean opens his mouth, about to tell her so, but she's already looked away and whipped out her phone to call 911. And while Sam seems pretty sure that Dean's gonna live, Dean's not so sure, so he just lays there and concentrates on breathing in and out until the moment passes.

Finally, he can hear the distant strains of an ambulance siren. Sam sags like someone cut her strings, and she grips Dean's hand tightly. Dean decides now would be a great time to pass out, and does so.

On the bright side, though? They totally wasted that poltergeist.

 

*

 

After Dean's been in the hospital for three days, Sam starts getting really twitchy.

"Did that janitor seem odd to you?" she asks for the umpteenth time. Dean shrugs, too busy trying to keep his green Jello from escaping his bowl. Sam's been jumpy ever since Dean almost got eviscerated, which, yeah, Dean gets that. Even though it turned out to just be a nasty slice that hadn't nicked anything important, Sam still keeps looking at Dean like he's going to disappear.

At Dean's non-response, Sam gives an exasperated sigh and gets up, leaving the room without a word. She's probably going to go follow the janitor, make sure he's not whipping up demons in his mop bucket.

Sam comes back about twenty minutes later, her face white. "Dean?" Sam says. "We've got to get out of here."

Dean freezes, fork of Jello halfway to his mouth. "You're shitting me."

"I am so not fucking shitting you," says Sam. "We have to go _now._"

She fills him in when they're both in the Impala and a good few miles out of town, Dean's lap loaded up with stolen antibiotics and painkillers. Sam keeps tucking her hair behind her ear and looking in the rearview mirror, and it's really kind of making Dean nervous. He's still shaky enough from blood loss that he doesn't need anything else adding to it, but Dean knows that Sam must've had good reason to yank them both out of there, so he keeps his mouth shut.

"The fucking janitor," Sam says finally, "The fucking janitor likes to watch FBI's Most Wanted after he gets off work."

Dean's stomach drops about five feet and to the left. "Did he -"

"Recognize you?" Sam gives a curt nod. "I followed him until he got on the phone, then I picked up the other extension. Heard all of it. They were kind of blowing him off - he sounded like an old hick, you know, like maybe he was just calling for attention - but they said they'd check it out. They said they'd check it out, Dean. Tell me I overreacted."

Dean leans hard against the passenger side window and stares at nothing.

"You know what else they said?" Sam laughs a little wildly. "At first, before the janitor started describing you? They said, it's probably not him. It's probably not him, because this Dean Winchester, he never goes anywhere without his brother. That's how you find him, they said. Sam and Dean Winchester, they're inseparable, they'll never split up, no matter how much trouble they're in." Sam shoots a look at Dean out of the corner of her eye. "That's when the janitor told them you were with a girl, a girl you kept calling Sam."

Dean closes his eyes. "Jesus."

"Dean -"

"We're not splitting up, Sam," Dean says. He knows it's stupid, really fucking idiotic, actually, and it comes from the same part of Dean's brain that won't even entertain the thought of ditching the Impala, but it's more than that, too. He can't stand the thought of Sam being alone and unprotected. Not before, and especially not now.

Sam doesn't argue, just says, "We have to do _something_."

 

*

 

They stop at a drugstore. Dean is drawn to the boxes of platinum blonde bleach, keeps insisting that the Billy Idol look would totally work for him, but Sam just raises that eyebrow of hers and calls him "Spike" until he relents and goes for a darker shade.

A few hours later, Dean dyes his hair a muddy black in a dirty gas station bathroom sink, with Sam holding a hand over Dean's eyes and carefully rinsing the stuff out of Dean's hair so that he doesn't pull his stitches. Sam's hands are deft and her touch is warm, kind of like how Mom's hands were in that stupid djinn-induced fantasy, and Dean shies away from the weirdness of that thought.

"There you go," Sam says finally, and helps Dean rub his head dry with paper towels. Dean looks in the mirror, and he's not sure if he doesn't recognize himself because of the black hair or because his face looks like a goddamn corpse, all hospital-white with big black circles under his eyes.

"I look like a fucking Nine Inch Nails groupie," Dean snaps, and Sam just buries her face in Dean's neck and laughs and laughs.

 

*

 

In Michigan, Sam says, "You know, we could stop."

Dean just looks at Sam, the stubborn jut of her jaw, and wonders if she knows what she's asking.

He keeps driving.

 

*

 

Sam makes Dean grow his hair out, until it's just long enough to brush down over the faint, distinctive scars on Dean's forehead. Logistically it makes sense, but it drives Dean crazy to have hair in his eyes. Sam just laughs at him, points out that it's not even long enough to be in his eyes and that he should stop being a baby. Whatever. It itches.

Sam's own hair has grown out to her shoulders, thick and wavy, though she keeps it pulled back in a ponytail most of the time. Every day that Dean looks at her, his brother seems a little further away.

"You know, I meant what I said," she says one day.

"Huh?" Dean takes them around a turn on an old country road, and trees stream past outside the windows. It's night, that pitch black that comes right before the sky starts to lighten again, and Dean's brights don't cut through nearly enough of the darkness.

"That it's okay."

"Vague much?"

Sam doesn't respond. It takes Dean a good ten minutes to place that comment, connect it to Sam's first day of being permanently girl and how she'd said _I see you watching_.

Dean really doesn't know what to say. Thinks about denying it, but that didn't work so well the last time. So he just doesn't say anything.

After a while, though, Sam continues. "You know," she says, "When we were kids, I used to have these crazy wet dreams."

Dean doesn't want to hear this.

"I know you don't want to hear this," Sam says, "But it's there, and we're stuck with each other, and I think we need to face up to it."

"You don't know what you're talking about," says Dean.

"And I'm telling you that I _do_," Sam insists. "You might have only noticed since I changed, but. Since I was fifteen, Dean. Whether you like it or not. And if that disgusts you, then just pull over and let me out right now, because -"

Dean pulls over, and Sam, despite her brave talk, goes pale and still. "What are you doing?"

"Sam. There's no place on earth where this is _right_," says Dean.

Sam lifts her chin. "No? Then what do you call this place, Dean? Right here. _Now._"

And Dean gives up, he just. He gives up. Sam's mouth is burning hot, and she sticks her tongue in his mouth like she's got years of something to prove. She straddles his lap, her ass pressing against the steering wheel, and Dean touches her breasts, puts his mouth on her. She shudders against him, damp cotton and the warm scent of her musk filling Dean's nostrils as she rocks against him. Dean wonders how wet she is.

Somehow Sam wriggles out of her jeans, and Dean's fingers are buried deep in that wet heat, and he suddenly realizes _this is not just any girl, this is Sam_, and he kisses her, kisses Sam until he doesn't know where he is.

He comes back, though, just enough to shakily extract a condom from his wallet and hand it to Sam. She rolls it on him and sinks down, hips flexing as she straddles Dean's legs. She's tight, way too tight, and Dean is afraid he's hurting her, but she keeps going like it's a matter of pride, even though he can hear her groans and they sound more pained than pleasured. Finally, her brow evens out, her face clears, and something between the two of them shifts and then it's easy.

Dean can feel her all around him, and he wants to crawl into Sam's mouth, into Sam's cunt, and just never leave this place where he is surrounded, where he is _loved_.

Dean pants out a crazy string of things as Sam rides his dick, says shit about how beautiful Sam is, how gorgeous, how perfect, oh god, and he notices Sam's body getting more tense with each word out of Dean's mouth but he can't stop.

He comes, shuddering, and Sam kisses him on the forehead before she rolls off and falls back into the passenger seat. She slips on her pair of stretched, mutilated panties and presses her fingers to herself, feeling carefully between her legs like she's feeling where Dean's been.

Dean stares, and stares, catching his breath, then he pulls off the condom and pitches it out the window. Sam doesn't say one word about littering.

"Did you come?" says Dean, and he shocks himself, his own words send a flash of heat along his spine. _Did Sam come._ Not just that, he could _make_ Sam come.

"Not yet," says Sam, and she smiles sideways at Dean, looks out the window at the stars.

"Soon," Dean promises, and he puts the car in gear and tries not to drive off the road.


	2. Chapter 2

It's almost daylight and there's a gas station about twenty miles up the road. Dean pulls into the lot and goes in, buys a Coke and a couple of power bars and asks for the key to the bathroom. The bathroom door's on the outside of the building, dented gray metal with a padlock, and Sam's already leaning against it when Dean comes out with the key.

Dean fumbles the lock, hopes the owner of the gas station doesn't have a security camera installed, but they're in the middle of freaking nowhere, so probably not. When he gets the door open at last, Sam grabs him by the neck of his shirt and drags him in, slams him against the wall. She lets go of him only long enough to lock the door behind them, and Dean takes the opportunity to look around. There's scraps of toilet paper on the floor that stick to Dean's feet, a thin layer of soap scum where the dispenser splashes, and thick lines of rust in the sink, but Dean's seen worse.

Then Sam's back on him, licking and biting at Dean's lips, and Dean _really_ doesn't care.

He drops the bag and the Coke goes rolling across the disgusting floor. Sam's pawing Dean through his jeans, impatient.

"Condom?" Dean manages to get out. He runs his hands up under Sam's shirt and fumbles with her bra until it comes loose.

"Back pocket," Sam gasps, and Dean gets the condom packet from Sam's jeans and gives her ass a good grope as he does so. Sam chuckles and bites Dean's jaw. "Dean, I didn't figure you for an ass man," she says.

"I'm more about the whole package," Dean says, and grabs Sam's ass and shoves her hard against the sink, pinning her there.

Sam grinds against him, nipples poking against Dean's chest through the loosened fabric of her bra. Sam's not as tall as she used to be, which Dean always manages to forget until they're sparring or goofing off, but she's still almost as tall as Dean. "You like my tits, then?" she asks. "You like my mouth?"

Dean groans and kisses her, squeezes her breast in one hand and runs his thumbnail roughly over her nipple. The weight of her breast in his palm is both familiar and alien. _Sam._ Sam's breath catches, her mouth falls open under Dean's.

"How do you want it?"

Sam twists in Dean's arms until she faces the sink. She presses back against Dean's dick, still throbbing against the denim of his jeans, and says, "Like this."

"Whoa, Sammy." Dean gives a nervous laugh, ignoring the unexpected surge of arousal. "I don't think – now?"

"Not _that_," Sam says, rolling her eyes. "Jesus, Dean. Just – fuck me this way."

"Right." Dean gasps open-mouthed against the back of Sam's neck, says breathily, "I can do that."

He peels her jeans and underwear down with shaking hands and fumbles his own jeans open. Sam spreads her legs, braces herself for him, but she doesn't quite have the angle right, so Dean touches Sam's other leg to guide her, make her open up for him. His hand stutters along the base of her thigh. Dean tests her with his fingertips, hides a groan in her shoulder at how fucking wet she is. He wants to go to his knees for her, but now's not the time.

"Fucking _fuck_ me, fucker," says Sam, and Dean can't help but laugh as he's rolling on the condom.

"Think you coulda gotten a few more fucks in there, Sammy?"

"Jerk," Sam huffs at him, sounding amused. "You think _you_ can? Like, today?"

Dean catches Sam's face in the mirror and she's smiling. God, Dean knows that smile. He's missed it. He always misses it, but to see it now fills a spot in him that he hadn't even realized was empty.

Dean grabs Sam's thigh, stretching her leg until she's almost straddling the sink, then he presses in. He can feel her, hot and moist through the condom. Sam makes a noise like she's dying, and God, she's still so tight, still so fucking tight, and Dean's not gonna make it. He squeezes his other hand between Sam and the sink, grinds the palm of his hand against her clit.

Sam practically fucking _vibrates._

"Christ," Sam says. "Just do it, Dean."

She tosses her head, leans back against Dean's shoulder, and Dean stares at the Sam reflected in the mirror, this wanton _thing_. Her T-shirt is rucked up over her breasts, her bra hanging loose, and the crazy rearrangement of clothing makes Sam's breasts look like escapees from a mental institution, straightjackets and all. Dean fondly remembers that first couple of weeks when Sam refused to wear a bra and wonders if he can talk her into doing that again. He wants to imagine her bare under his hands.

Dean slams into her, eats up the whimper she makes, and finds himself wondering if Sam always used to make that whimper noise or if it's new. Then he decides to stop thinking about it, because there's no way he's ever gonna know. The old Sam is gone, and Dean's just got this one, and that's good enough.

Dean can't thrust as hard as he wants, otherwise the awkward angle makes him slip out, so he tries just flexing his hips against hers, shallow little thrusts that make Sam gasp. Dean's not the one that's supposed to be getting off, anyway – Dean wants to make Sam come, and come _hard_. He stops using his palm on her and uses his first two fingers to circle her clit, pressing hard against sensitive flesh until Sam whines and squirms against his hand. He's still got her pinned, pinned so firmly that neither of Sam's feet have to touch the ground. She's probably gonna have bruises on her hips from that damn sink. Maybe they both will.

Sam's gasping with every breath now, like she just can't get enough breath because of the things Dean's doing to her. He can feel her clit swell under his fingers, and her cunt keeps clenching around his cock in these little jerky spasms. With any regular girl, Dean would try some finesse, maybe draw it out a bit – hell, with any regular girl, Dean would have eaten her out before trying any of this shit, who knew Sam was so fucking easy – but this is Sam and Dean just wants to feel Sam come around him.

"Come on," Dean murmurs. "Come on, baby. Come for me. _Sam._"

Finally, Sam jerks and clamps down hard, spasms wracking her body. She bites her lip hard, her eyes squinched shut tight. Dean feels it through her whole body, feels the tremors and the following stillness. That's it. Dean whispers in her ear, says _Yeah, Sammy, yeah, just like that._

Sam slumps over the sink, trying to get her breath back. Dean extricates his hand from her as gently as he can, but she still flinches when his fingers brush her clit. He murmurs "Sorry," and God, he wants to lick his fingers clean, but instead he pulls out of Sam and strips off the condom. He's still hard, and while Sam pulls in thankful rasps of air, every limb screaming _sated_, Dean jerks off and watches Sam's face in the mirror.

The glass in the mirror is warped, and in the reflection, Sam looks like _Sam._

Dean comes all over Sam's ass, groaning. His jizz shines there against her skin, and Dean reaches out and rubs it into the flesh of her lower back. He wants her to smell like him. He wants – Shit, Dean's so fucked up. He's so very fucked in the head.

Sam makes a disgusted noise and twists to check out the state of her ass. "Dude, what the hell are you doing?"

"I –" Dean begins.

"Never mind," says Sam wryly. "I think I can guess. That's so gross, Dean. Yuck."

It takes a moment for Dean to get out of whatever headspace he's sunk into, and by the time he collects himself enough to fire back some witty quip, Sam's looking concerned.

"Hey," she says quietly. "You okay with this?"

"Yeah, I'm okay," Dean says. He's not quite sure if that's true or not, but whatever he _is_ feeling, he doesn't know how to put it into words. "What about you?"

Sam cracks a smile. "Looking for me to feed your ego? I'm more than okay. That was awesome, man. Intense, but awesome." She wrinkles her nose as she draws away from the sink, like she's feeling the pull of Dean's come drying on her skin. Dean holds back a shiver.

"Don't look so pleased with yourself," Sam says. "You're totally wiping your gunk off my ass before we go back out to the car. You are _so gross_, Dean."

Dean doesn't point out to Sam that the bathroom is out of paper towels; he just drops to his knees on that gross tile floor and cleans Sam off the old fashioned way.

And then if Dean gets a little carried away and starts licking Sam elsewhere, too, well, that's just a potential hazard associated with Dean's methods. Sam certainly doesn't seem to mind.

 

*

 

Sex. Sex with Sam. It's like someone took their finger out of the crack in the dam, and now the river's breaking through aged, crumbling concrete and forging a new course, eradicating everything in its path. Nothing can stop it. Dean feels dizzy all the time, can't fully wrap his head around the fact that it's actually _happening._

They fuck every night, every day, sometimes at every bathroom stop. The first time they do it in a real bed, Dean goes a little crazy, he kisses and touches Sam everywhere he can reach and a few other places he shouldn't be able to. He needs to know Sam, to map all this new skin and old scars onto a frame he remembers.

When Dean does start thinking about what they're doing – and it's always _what they're doing_, because Dean can't bring himself to label it, all those words like _incest_ and _perversion_ hanging over his head – Dean has no idea how it's ever going to be normal between them again. Sam's his responsibility, his kid sister, and what Dean's doing with Sam now is not part of any Big Brother Handbook Dean's ever seen.

This thing that he and Sam are weaving between them, with its unspoken weights and twisted promises, the taste of Sam's mouth, the soft skin of her arms... it feels like sin. And at the same time, it feels like something Dean needs.

Dean doesn't know what to do.

 

*

 

Sam comes into the motel room looking shifty. She's carrying a plastic bag from some local department store, and Dean almost riffs on her for picking up such a chick habit as shopping, but something in Sam's face makes him stop.

Sam goes into the bathroom and closes the door, and Dean stares after her. Sometimes Dean knows exactly what Sam's thinking, but other times Sam's freaking inscrutable.

Dean waits a while, wondering what Sam's up to, then he turns back to QVC. They're trying to sell very ugly emerald jewelry, and Dean is trying to imagine the kind of person that would actually wear the crap and managing to give himself the willies in the process.

He's so wrapped up in the image – some gargantuan woman with huge, fat fingers, maybe? Or maybe some little slip of a thing with a sharp chin and mean eyes. Who the fuck even wears emeralds? Dean's always thought girls were supposed to dig diamonds, gold and all that shit – that Dean doesn't notice when Sam finally emerges from the bathroom.

When Dean looks up, he doesn't know quite what he's seeing at first. Then Sam shifts uncomfortably, and Dean blinks, takes in the whole outfit – the lacy purple bra, the matching purple panties stretched across Sam's strong, slim thighs. And, shit, she's wearing stockings and garters, too, and yeah, that's a kink. Dean sits up straight on the bed, both to get a better look at Sam and hide how hard he's getting.

Sam stares back at Dean, seeming oddly hesitant despite her elaborate get-up. Everything's satin or see-through or lace, a major change from the usual plain cotton that Sam likes. Her messy hair is carefully styled into waves, and she's wearing eyeliner and some sticky lipgloss.

Dean swallows, feeling rather uncomfortable, but he'll go along with whatever scenario Sam has planned. He's never doubted Sam's schemes before, and if this'll get Sam off, then Dean's up for it. Plus, _garters_.

"Well, hi, sugar," Dean drawls.

There's a flicker of something in Sam's face, then she flutters her eyelashes at Dean. The fluttering looks kind of dumb, actually, but all in all, Sam's pretty hot. Kind of like Victoria's Secret chewed her up and spat her back out, but hot. Totally Dean's type, actually.

"Hey, stud," Sam says, and Dean holds back the laughter that threatens at the sound of Sam's sexy-voice.

Dean leans back on the bed, careful to display his package. He knows this game. "You want to come sit on my lap, sweetheart?"

Sam crawls onto the bed, and Dean spreads his legs to accommodate her. She straddles him, her breasts jiggling in the push-up bra, and Dean pulls Sam toward him until he can mouth at the tops of them, the pale flesh where they spill out from the ugly lace.

Sam moans softly, and Dean palms her through her underwear, rubbing at the scratchy lace. She lets him do that for a minute, then reaches down and moves his hand away.

Oh, so it's that kind of game. Dean settles back, waits for instructions. Then he realizes Sam's just looking at him, like she's waiting for instructions too. There's an awkward pause.

"I thought –" says Sam.

"What do –" say Dean at the same moment. They pause. "You first."

"I want to suck you," Sam blurts.

Dean goes really, amazingly hard. "What?"

Sam looks flustered. "I mean, that's what you want, right?"

Dean's brain is screaming _Hell yes,_ but then there's something about Sam's tone that warns him off.

He says, "Is that what _you_ want?"

"Jesus, Dean, it's not about what I want," says Sam. She freezes, as if hearing how bad that sounded. "That's not what I mean, I – I thought this is what you wanted," like that makes it sound any better.

"What was?" asks Dean, afraid of the answer.

Sam shrugs. "I know that the whole Playboy look gets you off, man, I was just trying to – hey!" and she curses as Dean shoves her off of him and sits up.

Dean wonders if Sam knows how much of a jackass she's being. But Sam's expression doesn't change. She's honestly confused. She thought Dean _wanted_ this?

Dean stops and looks at her. At Sam. For a dizzying moment Dean can't see Sam in this girl's body, no matter how long her legs are and how familiar her eyes. He can't find his brother in the soft, round belly and the curved hips of this woman, with her lipgloss lips and her uncertainty. Sam has _always_ been certain, Sam was always certain of everything in his life, even when it drove Dean crazy.

In the past few months, Dean's put his hands all over her, felt her _everywhere_ like he never did with Sam, and it makes him sick, it makes him sick and his brother is gone.

Oh, God, no. His brother is _gone_.

Sam has noticed Dean freezing and she's suddenly all concerned eyes and grasping hands, saying "Dean, Dean, what is it? What's wrong?" and Sam's overbearing concern and nosiness, that at least hasn't changed, not like everything else.

Dean can't even begin to explain how he feels, not without upsetting Sam. He wants to cry, because Sam might be here, but his brother is _gone_. Dean's brother is gone, and Dean never got to hold him, never got to touch him like this, and never will. Sam is here, but Dean's brother is _dead_.

Sam turns Dean's face up to hers, slim, long-fingered hands on Dean's jaw, and she peers into his eyes for some kind of explanation. But Dean can't. He just can't.

He guesses she must get some idea, though, because suddenly her face hardens. Her mouth seals into a thin line, and she lets go of Dean like she's been burnt.

Dean's stomach drops. Fuck. Whatever he was feeling, whatever he was mourning, this is worse.

"Dean," says Sam, and her voice cracks like Sam's voice at fifteen, unsteady. "Don't you – this is _me_, why does it matter? This is _me._"

"It doesn't," Dean says faintly, and he's not sure if he's lying. He hopes he's not. "It doesn't matter, it doesn't."

He's not sure if Sam hears him, though, because she tears herself away from Dean and stalks into the bathroom, angry and naked. He hears the door lock.

"Shit," Dean says. He goes over to the door and knocks. "Sammy. Sammy!"

"That's not my fucking name!"

Dean hears a clatter, like Sam's knocking things around in there, and he wonders how badly you can really trash a motel bathroom on an average day. His past experiences with it have all involved hunts gone wrong and copious amounts of bleeding, nothing that a good mop wouldn't fix.

Then there's a shattering noise, maybe the mirror, and Dean starts slamming his palm on the door, swearing he's gonna knock the whole fucking thing down if she doesn't unlock it right now, Jesus Christ, Sammy, _Sam._

Sam unlocks the door.

The first thing Dean notices when he pushes into the bathroom is that Sam's crying, big gulping sobs, unabashed tears running down her face. Sam almost never cries, but when he does, he's not ashamed; he doesn't hide it. She's no different now.

No different. Dean tells himself that, pushes the thought into his brain and hopes it'll stick.

Dean hugs her, wraps her up in his arms. Sam pushes her wet, snotty face into his neck, gasping for air through her sobs. Yeah, and she did break the mirror, Dean can see the jagged cracks in the frame over her shoulder.

"I hate that I can only have you like this," she gasps. "It's like cheating, it doesn't feel right. I can't take it."

"What are you talking about?" Dean asks. He hums and pets her back, running his hand down her spine like he'd soothe a ruffled cat. He's done this. He's done this to Sam. God, Dean's fucked it up.

"Why won't this work?" Sam asks, not answering. "Christ, Dean, it's all I've got, man. It has to work."

"It works," says Dean. He cradles the back of her head in one hand, twists his fingers through her hair. "It works, okay? It works really well. Hasn't it been working well?"

"_No,_" and Sam shoves at him, trying to get him off of her. Dean lets go and steps back, hands at his sides. "No, Dean, it hasn't been working well, because I've been scared out of my fucking _mind_, Dean. I don't want to lose you."

Dean shakes his head. "You're not going to lose me."

"Oh, really?" Sam challenges. "And what about the day when I don't, I don't _fake_ it well enough, and you remember that I'm not actually some new, hot girl you've been fucking, I'm your _brother_. What happens when you can't pretend anymore. What then?"

There's an incredible amount of things wrong with what Sam just said, so Dean focuses on the first one, his mouth going dry. "You've been faking it? I thought you – I thought you liked the sex."

"Not the sex, Dean." Sam holds her arms out, displaying the lacy bra, panties, garters. "This."

It was a costume. Dean had known that, he just hadn't realized the reasons behind it. She – what, she thought Dean needed that? To just lie back and think of Carmen Electra? That wasn't what Dean needed, that was the whole fucking _problem_.

"Listen, Sam, you don't have to dress up for me." He risks a hand on Sam's shoulder, but she shrugs him off. "You don't have to play at being a girl."

_In fact, please don't, I'd rather think of my brother when I'm fucking you,_ Dean doesn't say.

Sam is silent a little too long. "Oh," she says.

"Right," Dean says. "So that's not an issue. Are we okay, now?"

Sam just shakes her head. "I don't get it," she says, and she's not even paying attention to Dean anymore, she's just figuring this stuff out in her head. "I don't know why you, you give me this look sometimes like you're – wait." Sam looks up at him, her face full of some terrible realization. "You – you're looking at me like that because _you miss him_?"

And that's it, game over, the final betrayal. Dean takes a step back, wondering how the hell he can fix this.

Sam's gone and uncovered the whole thing that Dean's been trying to hide from her. This, this is worse than Dean's desire for her. This is the desire for the _old_ Sam, for the one he's never going to get back.

She was never supposed to know.

"That's it," Sam says, reading the truth off Dean's face. "I was wrong. I thought that you had only started... wanting me, once I changed, and that's why you... but that's not it at all, huh?"

She wraps her arms around herself, looks Dean in the face, as resigned as Dean's ever seen her. Him. Sam.

"I'll go," says Sam. "If this is going to be weird, I'll just, I'll go."

No.

Dean's throat closes up and he can't speak, can't even convey how _wrong_ that would be. He shakes his head.

"Dean," Sam says, her voice weirdly tight, like she might cry again. "I can't be him again, either. I can't be either one. I can't be anything that you want, okay? This won't work."

"You _are_ what I want," Dean says. The words feel like something ripping. "The only thing. The only thing, Sam." The only fucking thing he's got left.

He steps in and kisses Sam, his whole body trembling, afraid of the answer he's going to get from her lips.

Sam opens her mouth, lets Dean in, wipes the moisture from his face with her palms. She doesn't protest when Dean turns desperate, when he presses her against the bathroom sink and sweeps away the broken shards of the mirror, glass catching on his hands.

Dean yanks at his boxers, presses into Sam and fucks her against the fake marble sink and the empty, barren frame of the fucking mirror. He kisses her until the urge to smash something dissipates, until the salty tears back up in his throat and leave him swallowing them down, swallowing everything down, and it's just _Sam_, legs wrapped around Dean's waist until he can only thrust deeper, her body rocking against his, head thrown back, long tanned neck, perfect, so fucking perfect, made for him.

When Dean finishes, gasping and stuttering into her body like a madman, she says nothing, just lets Dean grow soft inside her. When, finally, he slips out, she takes Dean's hands and turns his palms up to the light, inspecting the bloody scratches on them for glass splinters.

"Should have used a dustpan," she says.

Dean tugs his hands away, pressing them to Sam's face, ignoring the bloody fingerprints he's leaving on her cheekbones.

Sam says, "You got some kind of fetish about bathroom sinks? I mean, one time's a fluke. But how many times is this?"

Dean shakes his head, tightening his grip on Sam's face until her eyes snap back to his. She has to listen to this.

"You're – you're mine, okay?" he says. "You're _Sam_. Nothing is ever going to change that."

Sam looks at him for a long moment, then nods.

"Okay," she says. A brief pause, and then: "You're mine, too, you know. My big brother, always."

"Sap," says Dean.

"Yeah, well," says Sam. She runs her palms under Dean's eyes, catching more tears, then gently presses her fingertips to Dean's closed eyelids, then replaces them with her lips, and Dean wonders if Sam always had this tenderness, if maybe people like Jess had seen Sam be this gentle.

He wonders what makes him deserve this tenderness now, after so long.

He wonders if more has changed between him and Sam than can even be measured.

"Hey," says Sam, "You're thinking. Stop that. Looks like it hurts."

"Bitch," says Dean, then freezes for a second, discovering yet another difference to come to terms with, but Sam just smiles.

"Jerk," Sam finishes, and she pushes Dean off and goes to rummage through their packs for some antibiotic ointment and band-aids.

 

*

 

Now, Dean feels Sam's eyes on him at weird times. When he looks back at her, she always gives him a sheepish grin and changes the subject. Weird. He doesn't really care why she's watching him, though. She looks happy.

It's not until days later that Dean realizes that they didn't use a condom, but by that time Sam's already limping around their motel room and complaining about cramps.

Dean's never been so glad to see a box of Tampax in the bathroom before in his life.

 

*

 

Despite what Dean had told Sam, it still takes a while. Sometimes he finds himself thinking of Sam as his _sister_, like she's always been that girl. When that happens, Dean has to stop and just breathe for a minute until he can remember Sam's old wide grin, his strong, muscular arms, his stupid hair, remember it and match it up to the Sam he's with. Dean needs Sam to be in one piece in his mind, but he can't just – shit – forget the past twenty-five years like they never happened.

It's not until Dean stops grieving that he even realizes that's what he was doing in the first place. The realization comes on the day that Dean's bickering with Sam over another series of escalating pranks, one that left the box of condoms glued solidly to the motel's Gideon bible – and really, what was Sam's obsession with gluing things, anyway?

Dean has managed to get the box open and extract a condom, and he's in the middle of tumbling Sam into bed and pressing his fingers against the dampness of her cotton underwear when he suddenly realizes that he's finally not thinking of Sam as two different people anymore. It's just all Sam. Sam's arms around him are as familiar and welcome as they ever were.

Some things, of course, are still different. Sam bucks up against him, wet and frantic around his cock, her legs wrapped around his waist.

"Fuck me," she pants. "Fuck me, fuck, fuck, _Dean_."

Sam comes in a wave, trembling in Dean's arms. She's said that's one of the best things about being a chick – the way she can just come and come with her whole body. Dean would envy her, but frankly, he never cares about his own orgasm so much as he wants to see Sam lose it, wants to see her utterly sated and – happy.

She rolls off of Dean's cock, spent, and tiredly strokes Dean's cheek and shoulders as Dean wraps a hand around his dick and finishes the business of getting off. He wore Sam out, he supposes, because her eyelids are drooping and the tone of her voice has a far-off sound to it, like part of her is already asleep.

"We could just stop," she says. "Couldn't we?"

Dean blinks up at the ceiling, half-hard, and thinks about it.

He _really_ thinks about it, thinks about it until his erection is long forgotten and his brain is humming with what-ifs, feeling terrified and ecstatic at once.

Sam hasn't had a vision in months. Ash hasn't found any patterns pointing to the Demon, lately, and Bobby hasn't heard a twitter from any exorcisms. And Dean and Sam have been keeping a low profile, going on a few odd hunts here and there, but mainly just blending in with the scenery. They hadn't had an FBI scare since the hospital. From all they could tell, they were off the radar.

Maybe. It was unthinkable, but maybe – there was no way they could, but _maybe._

Long minutes pass. He expects Sam to have fallen asleep already, but her eyes are still open when Dean turns to face her. Her gaze glitters in the dark, steady on Dean's face.

"We don't know that the Demon's lost track of you," Dean says.

"We do," says Sam. "_I_ know."

Dean blinks. "Huh?"

Sam sighs. "My head feels... clean. No headaches. I can't be a hundred percent sure, but seventy or eighty percent? Yeah. He doesn't have a pipeline to my brain anymore."

"Seventy percent's not exactly safe," Dean says.

"It's as safe as we're going to get," Sam replies. "We've earned this, Dean."

Dean stares at her for a long time, and Sam waits, being surprisingly patient.

"No," says Dean, and Sam's face shutters up. Without a word, she turns over, leaving Dean with a view of her implacable back.

Seventy percent isn't enough of a chance. It's not worth risking Sam, letting down their guard only to have something shitty and terrible happen again. Dean won't build up a life only to have it ripped apart.

He hopes Sam understands that, eventually.

 

*

 

On their next job, Sam almost gets gored by something that looks a lot like a unicorn, something that Dean would ordinarily have laughed about. She twists away just in time, and the creature's horn just scores her side, leaving a long gouge that bleeds like fuck.

Dean cleans Sam up once they're back in the room, starts stitching up the wound, and wonders how many times he's going to have Sam's blood all over his hands.

Sam peers at the gouge. "Dude," she says wonderingly. "Lucky thing I've got a chick's waist, huh? A couple more inches of torso there and I'd have been screwed."

Yeah, Dean thinks. Maybe Sam's right. The horn would have lodged in the left side of Sam's abdomen, and the way that thing was running, it would have kept going and carried off a hefty chunk of Sam with it.

For a minute he imagines Sam ripped open, bleeding out before Dean could even get there, and he loses his grip on the needle.

"Shit," says Dean, hunting for it with his hands. It blends in with the motel blanket, and he can't find it. "Shit."

"Dean?" Sam says, and Sam's blood is all over Dean's hands. He can't do this.

Sam's asked him twice, now. Third time's the charm.

"Yeah," Dean says shakily. "Yeah, we could stop."

 

*

 

They're already in Montana, so they drive to Billings to rent an apartment. Dean makes bad jokes about "billings the rent" until both Sam and the realtor are ready to strangle him.

"We've earned this," Sam had told him, and she was right. If the demon's lost their trail, if the FBI can't find them, then this is it. This is their chance to step out and get their lives back.

They can't agree on which apartment they want. Sam complains that all the ones that Dean approves of look like motel rooms, to which Dean replies that all the apartments that Sam likes have ceilings high enough to hang himself in. They compromise.

Finding names is easier. Dean knows a guy in Rhode Island who owes him a favor, and he arranges to have new identities made-to-order. Dean scribbles long lists of possible names, most of which Sam turns her nose up at. Sam wants them to be Jack and Meg White. She thinks it's hilarious until Dean tells her that he really doesn't want to think of Sam as any kind of Meg, and she has to agree.

Luckily, Dean has a much better idea.

"Hi!" Dean tells their new neighbors, his smile bright and fake enough to make a counterfeiter cry. "We're the Ramones. Just thought we'd swing by and say hi."

"The Ramones, Dean?" Sam says later, once they'd introduced themselves to everyone in the apartment building. "The _Ramones_?"

Dean waggles Sam's new photo ID at her. "You're Dee Dee Ramone. I'm Joey."

"You're an idiot," Sam tells him. She snags the ID and inspects the picture for Deanna Ramone. "Hey, this is pretty good."

They fix up the apartment with some cheap furniture from Big Lots. Dean drives around the city on trash night, eying the sidewalks for anything else they can use, and they end up with a couple of rugs and a small bookshelf that's only slightly stained.

There's only one bedroom in the apartment. One bedroom, and it's theirs. Just as Dean's about to go down on Sam in their new bed, with its bright white sheets that are crisp from newness instead of starched rewashing – Sam rolls Dean onto his back and straddles his waist. Her pubic hair tickles his stomach and Dean runs his thumb down her mound, going straight for the clit like Sam likes it.

Sam slaps his hand away.

"You know what I'm thinking?" she asks.

"I think so, Brain, but what will we do with the five bananas?" Dean retorts, and Sam's face creases in a mix of laughter and consternation. Then she goes for his ribs, fingers splayed, and Dean curls away from her hands, laughing helplessly. "Okay," he gasps, "Okay. No, Sam, what are you thinking?"

Sam puts her arms on either side of Dean's head and leans down until they're face-to-face. Dean leans up for a kiss, and she meets him halfway, makes it slow and lingering until she pulls away again.

"I'm thinking that I want to have your cock in my mouth," says Sam, and with that, she slithers down Dean's body and licks the head of his dick. Then she puts her lips around him, hollows her cheeks out and runs her tongue around the tip.

"Jesus, Sam." Dean throws his head back. It's not the best blowjob in the world. Sam's kind of awkward, keeps forgetting that her mouth is smaller than it used to be, but it's Sam and that makes it good enough.

When Dean comes, he closes his eyes tight, concentrating on the feel of Sam's mouth and hands. Once Sam decides she's done, she laughs and sprawls next to Dean, kicking one leg over his.

"Okay, so maybe that kind of sucked," Sam says.

"Heh," Dean grins, and he doesn't even have to finish his remark before Sam whaps him in the shoulder. "Ow!"

"I'm much better at eating pussy," Sam tells him matter-of-factly. "But I'm sure I'll get the hang of it."

Dean's too sleepy to really reply – he was exhausted from moving furniture even before Sam blew him. They stare at the ceiling for a while – their ceiling, their walls, their bed, Jesus Christ – then Sam says, "I knew what you were doing, you know."

Actually, Dean doesn't know, and says so. "Huh?"

"The sex," Sam says. "I'm not saying it's bad, but. You act like it's your duty to please me or something. Like I'm some kind of orgasm machine and you just have to keep popping in quarters."

She doesn't act like she's expecting an answer, so Dean doesn't give one.

"Just give me a chance to even the score, sometimes," says Sam. Her voice is casual, but she looks at Dean like she's trying to stare her words right into his soul. "This thing goes both ways, Dean."

Oh, please, save Dean from transparent metaphors. He's warmed, though, and the reassurance worms its way under his ribcage and gets into his heart. He closes his eyes.

Sam kicks Dean in the ankle, rolls over and kisses him. He can taste himself in her mouth. Dean kisses her back, and he thinks about all the things he wanted that he never got, and this one thing that he did.

 

*

 

At first, Dean doesn't' recognize the thing he's found in Sam's dresser, thinks maybe it's allergy medication. By the time it clicks, Dean's been staring at the foil package for a good minute and Sam's giving him a weird look.

"Is this –" says Dean.

"Yeah," says Sam. "I picked up some birth control pills while we were in Pennsylvania a couple months ago."

"Huh." Dean tucks the pills back in Sam's bag, tries not to remember the safe sex talk he'd had with Sam when Sam was thirteen. "Good idea."

_Sometimes condoms break, and when shit like that happens, it's good if the girl's on the pill. Make sure you don't have any little Sammys running around._

He thinks, breathless for a moment, of how very screwed they might have been if Sam hadn't remembered what Dean was too much of a dumbass to remember. Dean's just been – they've been having a _lot_ of sex. A lot of sex with just condoms as barrier, and that one time with nothing at all, and if Sam –

"Jeez, what crawled up your ass?" Sam asks, and Dean just shakes his head.

"I'm gonna go out for a bit," Dean tells her, and he leaves.

 

*

 

Later that night, Dean's got his nose pressed up in Sam's armpit, all salty smell and soft skin. Sam still doesn't shave very often, maybe every week or so if she remembers, and there's a dark shadow of coarse hair under Sam's arm that Dean kind of wants to lick a line across.

Dean closes his eyes instead, bumps Sam with his forehead and says, "I just hadn't thought about it." He lays a hand on Sam's stomach, palm spread. "That you could get pregnant, now."

Sam snorts, digs her chin into the top of Dean's head. "Well, that's kind of implied with the uterus, dude."

Dean ignores that. "But isn't it, I don't know, weird? To have that feeling?"

"What feeling? Like a sperm is gonna slip and fall up my vagina and oops, maybe I'll have to change diapers for a mutant kid for my whole life?"

Sam's voice isn't cruel, but she obviously doesn't understand what Dean's trying to say. Dean's not even sure if _he_ knows.

"But you _could_," says Dean. "You could get pregnant."

Something must have come out in Dean's tone that he didn't intend, but it doesn't take him long to realize that Sam's inhaled sharply, that her stomach is tense under his palm.

"What? No!" Dean jerks his hand away. "I didn't mean _me_. Jesus Christ, I mean – no!"

"Right, I knew that." Sam's laugh is a little shaky, but Dean lets it go.

"But someone else," says Dean, and Christ, this is not a good idea, he has no idea why he's pushing this. "Sam, you could have kids if you wanted."

She's silent for a moment, then says, "Who would the father be?"

Dean blinks. "Uh. I don't know?"

Sam snuggles into Dean's side. "I could pick someone up at a truck stop, maybe? Or go to a sperm bank? How would you feel with someone else's kid just crawling around in my guts?"

"It wouldn't be someone else's kid," says Dean. "It'd be yours."

"It'd be _ours_." She ignores Dean's startled flinch, squeezes his arm. "Wouldn't it. That's what you're saying."

"I'm not saying anything," says Dean.

"Dean," and Sam rolls over and is suddenly in his face, her serious expression hovering right over his. "Do you want to have a kid? Do you want _me_ to have one?"

Dean squirms out from under her and sits up. "I don't _want_ you to do anything," he says. "Sam. Jesus. Just, no. No way."

He knows that Sam can see the lie painted all over him. She knows that Dean's always wanted a family, always wanted to carry on the line, always wanted to have someone call him "dad."

Always known it was impossible.

"Okay," Sam says quietly. "That's what I thought."

They don't talk about it again.

 

*

 

Sam gets a job as a research assistant at the local college. Dean sits around and watches infomercials for a week, then starts looking into any possible hauntings in the area. Within two months, he and Sam have cleared out all the malevolent spirits in a hundred-mile radius. Then Dean gets bored again, and somehow finds himself at the local radio station. They look over the fact that he's got no experience, deciding that the fact that he's been listening to radio all over the country for the past twenty-five years makes up for it.

Before Dean knows it, he's DJ-ing for a couple hours, four nights a week. The pay's for shit, but Dean gets call-ins and can play pretty much any music he wants. Nobody riding shotgun to whine about the sixth Metallica song in a row. It's not perfect, but it's okay.

At some point, Dean realizes he's happy, and he doesn't quite know how to deal with that. He'd imagine it's something like being in a foreign country, bumbling around and trying to learn a whole new language. He doesn't know this world, this bright shining thing where he can wake up in the morning with Sam beside him and know that neither of them will die that day.

Wishful thinking, of course. Dean knows better than anyone how suddenly death can loom in front of you. But Dean has hope, and that's better than anything else he's had for the past two years.

Except for Sam. Sam is always better.

Sam grows her hair out long, and Dean doesn't say anything, but he starts having dreams where Sam's pinned to the ceiling above him, mouth open wide, blood dripping from her stomach. He wakes up coughing from smoke that isn't there.

When Sam gets in a fit of pique one day and chops it all back to chin-length, Dean doesn't complain. Without the long hair, Sam stops looking so much like Mom, and the dreams stop.

Dean never doubted they would; he's not the brother with the nightmares who come true, after all.

 

*

 

Sam visits Dean at the radio station one day, and although at first he thinks _Something's happened,_ he waves her into the sound booth He's playing _Highway to Hell_, and Sam gives him a fond smile.

"You're going to call me a pussy," Sam says, "But I brought you lunch. No boogers or worms or anything. Just chicken salad."

"Thanks," Dean says around his mouthful. It's really good chicken salad, he doesn't know why Sam is making that disgusted face. A piece of bread falls into Dean's lap, and he picks it up and crams it in his mouth with the rest. Sam shakes her head at him. Weirdo.

She sits on the floor and leans against the wall, munching on her own sandwich. "You really like it here, huh?" she says.

"Sure," Dean says. He finishes the sandwich and hunts around for his Coke. Sam points out a can hidden behind the speaker, and Dean gulps it down. "Yeah, I mean. It's cool."

"I quit my job today," Sam says, and yeah, Dean figured it was something like that. "I just couldn't take it anymore. They were a bunch of chauvinist pigs."

"I know, you were telling me." Dean offers Sam the Coke, and she takes a sip and hands it back.

"Anyway, and then I started thinking about it. I mean, I used to be like them, Dean."

"I don't think you could have been a chauvinist pig if someone replaced your brain with Hitler's, Sammy."

Sam rolls her eyes. "You know what I mean. I used to be a _guy_."

She falls silent while Dean cues up the next couple of songs, then he nods for her to go on.

"But that thought... it was so far away. It was like I was thinking about someone else." She shakes her head. "Not in a weird way, though. Not like I'm making it sound. It was good that it was far away. It felt comfortable. It felt like, hey, this is _me_ now."

Dean offers her the Coke again, but she shakes her head. "Nah, man. It's gone flat. I don't know how you can drink it like that. But, do you know what I mean? I don't sound crazy?"

"You always sound crazy," Dean tells her. She narrows her eyes at him, and Dean relents with a shrug. "Nah, man. I mean, you know I had a hard time with it, and it didn't have anything to do with me. So if it doesn't bother you, that's good."

Sam nods. "Yeah. It just felt permanent, that's all. And those guys were cracking jokes and trying to pinch my ass, and I was like, shit. I'm a woman, and this is what I get?" She laughs to herself and finally takes another bite of her sandwich. Dean wonders if she's going to eat the whole thing or just take it to a movie.

"What do you want me to tell you, Sammy?" Dean says finally.

Sam shakes her head. "I don't want you to tell me anything. I just wanted to tell _you_."

"Oh." Dean pauses. "Good."

She chews slowly. Dean tells his listeners that it's nice outside, going to be a sunny day, then he puts on some Zeppelin. _Steady-rolling woman gonna come my way._ Sam glances up when she hears the lyrics, snickers at him.

"You trying to get me to blow you under the desk?" she says.

"Hey, if the mood strikes," says Dean. He shakes his head, though, and Sam finishes her sandwich.

"Sammy?" Dean says a minute later.

"Yeah?"

"I'm glad you're okay."

Sam smiles at him. "Yeah. Same to you."

"And later, you have to tell me every little detail of how you made those fuckers pay."

She chuckles. "Not much to tell. I gave them a stern talking-to, that's all. Although I did break one guy's fingers."

"Attagirl."

 

*

 

When the end comes, it comes easy. Dean sees it from a long way off, notices how Sam starts running in the mornings, how she hangs up a dartboard, and how sometimes, on the weekends, she goes into the woods to do target practice. Stuff that people don't usually do if all they're worried about is getting another research internship.

Part of Dean still hopes he's misinterpreting the signs, but mainly he tries not to think about it. It'll happen when it happens. In the meantime, there's him and Sam, and that's enough.

Then Dean wakes up one night and finds Sam staring at the ceiling, striped in cool, night-hued moonlight from the open blinds. Dean recognizes that brooding look immediately. ("It's called being _contemplative_, asshole," Sam – the old Sam – had told him once. "You should try it sometime, you might learn something.")

Dean asks, "Bad dream?" by which he means, "Vision?" He thinks Sam would have told him if she'd started having them again, but he could be wrong.

"No," she says. "I was just thinking."

"Really?"

Sam chuckles and hits Dean with a pillow. "Shut up. I was _thinking_. About the Demon."

Dean quiets. Here it comes.

"He's still out there, doing god knows what. I mean, maybe I've fallen off his radar, maybe I haven't, but..." Sam trails off, goes back to inspecting the ceiling. "But does that make me any less responsible?"

"Um, yeah?" says Dean. "You're not responsible. You never were." He pauses, knows it's impossible to talk Sam out of this, but he feels like he has to say something. "Sam, if we were right... we're free of that son of a bitch. He can't fuck with your head anymore."

"Or so we think." Sam pauses. "But there are other people he's still fucking with. And maybe it's up to me to do something about it."

Dean says nothing.

Sam turns to him, blinking in the darkness. "Dean... He killed Jess. And Mom. And Dad."

"I know," says Dean. He knows.

Sam rolls onto Dean's half of the bed, snuggling into his side until Dean gives up and puts his arms around her. "I'm sorry," she says. "I wish I could just do this. I wish I could _have_ this."

And then, although she must know that Dean wouldn't, not in a million years: "You can stay here, if you want."

"No fucking way," says Dean. He tousles Sam's hair, pressing a kiss against the high slope of her forehead. "No. It's the two of us, together, that are gonna kill this fucker. You and me. I know that much."

It's so much easier to have hope, these days. It's so much easier to breathe. If they die because of this, Dean thinks, at least it'll be on their terms.

Sam smiles, pulls Dean in for a kiss.

They leave in the morning, windows rolled down and the road in front of them, where it always is.

 

*

 

A woman working as an office assistant at a local university files a sexual harassment complaint. A little boy turns up the stereo and decides he wants to be a DJ when he grows up. A couple of employees at a local diner note the absences at the table in the corner, the striking-looking couple that used to come in every Saturday.

Of the people that knew their names, a few note the disappearance of Joe and Deanna Ramone, but no one goes to the cops.

 

*

 

There's some lesson in here, about change, or destiny, or making the best of what you've got. A lesson about love, maybe, and looking past the outside into the inside.

Dean's not sure. Doesn't really care, either. The lessons aren't important, it's what you do with them.

Somewhere in New Mexico, Sam's looking through newspapers, circling obituaries and chewing on the end of her red marker. She's wearing a skirt as some relief from the heat, which Dean teased her about until she said _Easy access, dude. Shut up,_ and provided a demonstration which shut Dean up pretty quickly.

When Dean calls Ash to check up, see if he's found anything new. Ash says, _Man, thought you guys bit it! Haven't heard from you in ages._

_The rumors of our death..._ Dean trails off, looks up into the clear sky as he's listening to Ash rattle off some search results. Sam yawns, leans her head back against the seat.

It looks like it's going to be a sunny day.

 

end

 

"As We Are So Wonderfully Done with Each Other"  
by Kenneth Patchen

As we are so wonderfully done with each other  
We can walk into our separate sleep  
On floors of music where the milkwhite cloak of childhood lies

O my lady, my fairest dear, my sweetest, loveliest one  
Your lips have splashed my dull house with the speech of flowers  
My hands are hallowed where they touched over your soft curving.

It is good to be weary from that brilliant work  
It is being God to feel your breathing under me

A waterglass on the bureau fills with morning . . .  
Don't let anyone in to wake us.


End file.
